Storage and server provisioning for virtualized and geographically dispersed data centers

ABSTRACT

Geographically dispersed data centers each include servers and storage systems and are in communication with each other. An application is installed on a guest operating system on a virtual machine set up on a server at a first data center. The application accesses a logical unit on a storage system at the first data center. When migration of the application is initiated, the process determines whether any of the data centers has server resources and storage resources required to receive migration of the application. A destination data center is selected from candidate data centers meeting requirements for migration of the application. The application and guest operating system are migrated from the first data center to a second virtual machine set up on a second server at the destination data center. If a replica of the LU is not already present at the destination data center, the LU is also replicated.

BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION

1. Field of the Invention

The present invention relates generally to storage and informationsystems.

2. Description of Related Art

Large companies and other enterprises may have multiple data centersthat they use to conduct their business. For example, carriers whoprovide phone and Internet-related services will generally have multiplegeographically dispersed data centers to cover their service area. Theseenterprises may be running a variety of different services includingvoice transmission, e-mail, Internet access, messaging, video streaming,and the like, using servers and storage systems at the data centers.Thus, the effective and efficient use of resources such as the serversand storage systems in these data centers is necessary for thesuccessful operation of these enterprises.

Server virtualization is a technology that enables server consolidationin certain information system arrangements, such as at data centers, byallowing single physical servers to provide a plurality of virtualserver environments using virtual machine software. Under thistechnology, one or more physical servers can be divided into multiplevirtual server environments instead of having multiple dedicatedphysical servers, each running a different server environment. Servervirtualization can be used to eliminate the requirement for having alarge number of different physical servers in a data center, and therebyenable more efficient use of server resources, while improving serveravailability. Also, server virtualization can help reduce overall costs,reduce power consumption, reduce time for server provisioning,centralize server management and administration, assist in agile servicedeployment and improve disaster recovery capabilities. Furthermore, inaddition to server consolidation through virtualization, clustering ofservers through virtualization is also becoming common in data centersfor load balancing, high availability and disaster recovery. Throughclustering, loads on servers can be better distributed and availabilitycan be improved.

However, problems of coordination between server virtualizationmanagement and storage virtualization management currently exist forresource provisioning in environments including geographically-disperseddata centers. For example, using server virtualization technology, auser can migrate an application from a server at one data center to aserver at another data center. This does not pose a problem from theapplication standpoint since the CPU resources of a server at one datacenter are generally interchangeable with those at another data center.However, the storage resources which contain the data used by theapplication also need to be made available for the migrated application.

Additionally, as server consolidation makes progress, power consumptionper a certain cubic volume at data centers is increasing. Not only isthe power consumed directly by CPU chips and other components becoming aconcern, but also the cooling requirements for the servers, storagesystems, and the like. Thus, the cost of electricity is growing to be asignificant portion of the total cost of operation in some data centers.Further, the power consumption rate permitted is sometimes limited bycontracts with power suppliers. Such data centers are not permittedunder their contracts to use an amount of power over a specified limit,and raising the limit, will result in a higher monthly fee for the datacenter. Thus, data center operators need to monitor the trade offbetween application availability and power consumption costs.

Related art includes U.S. Pat. No. 6,854,034, to Kitamura et al.,entitled “Computer System and a Method of Assigning a Storage Device toa Computer”, the disclosure of which is incorporated herein byreference. However, the prior art does not disclose a provisioningmethod combining server virtualization management and storagevirtualization management that takes into consideration the availabilityof data replication and power consumption.

SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION

The invention provides for resource provisioning in a virtualizedenvironment combining server and storage management. In someembodiments, the invention may be applied in geographically disperseddata centers for improved function and efficiency. These and otherfeatures and advantages of the present invention will become apparent tothose of ordinary skill in the art in view of the following detaileddescription of the preferred embodiments.

BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS

The accompanying drawings, in conjunction with the general descriptiongiven above, and the detailed description of the preferred embodimentsgiven below, serve to illustrate and explain the principles of thepreferred embodiments of the best mode of the invention presentlycontemplated.

FIG. 1 illustrates an example of an arrangement of geographicallydispersed data centers in which the invention may be implemented.

FIG. 2 illustrates an exemplary configuration of a data center in whichthe invention may be implemented.

FIG. 3 illustrates an exemplary configuration of a server group.

FIG. 4 illustrates an exemplary configuration of a storage group.

FIG. 5 illustrates an exemplary remote copy configuration between twodata centers.

FIG. 6 illustrates an exemplary data structure of a server resourcetable of the invention.

FIG. 7 illustrates an exemplary data structure of a of a servervirtualization table of the invention.

FIG. 8 illustrates an exemplary data structure of a storage resourcetable of the invention.

FIG. 9 illustrates an exemplary data structure of a storage logical unittable of the invention.

FIG. 10 illustrates an exemplary data structure of a power consumptiontable of the invention.

FIG. 11 illustrates an exemplary data structure of a remote copy tableof the invention.

FIG. 12 illustrates an exemplary data structure of an applicationmigration table of the invention.

FIG. 13 illustrates an exemplary configuration of a remote copy statustransition.

FIG. 14 illustrates an exemplary configuration of an applicationmigration status transition.

FIG. 15 illustrates an exemplary process for provisioning resourcesaccording to the invention.

FIG. 16 illustrates an exemplary process for identifying requiredresources for provisioning.

FIG. 17 illustrates an exemplary process for searching for requiredresources within a local data center.

FIG. 18 illustrates an exemplary process for searching for requiredresources within a remote data center.

FIG. 19 illustrates an exemplary data structure of a server resourceconsumption table of the invention.

DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE INVENTION

In the following detailed description of the invention, reference ismade to the accompanying drawings which form a part of the disclosure,and, in which are shown by way of illustration, and not of limitation,specific embodiments by which the invention may be practiced. In thedrawings, like numerals describe substantially similar componentsthroughout the several views. Further, the drawings, the foregoingdiscussion, and following description are exemplary and explanatoryonly, and are not intended to limit the scope of the invention or thisapplication in any manner.

In some embodiments, the invention is applied to geographicallydispersed data centers operably connected for communication via a widearea network (WAN). Each data center may include a server group usingserver virtualization technology and a storage group using storagevirtualization technology. A Storage Area Network (SAN) may beimplemented at each data center for enabling data transfer betweenservers and storages, and data transfer between different storages.Also, a Local Area Network (LAN) can be used for any data transfer,including resource management. Management software is implemented formanaging server virtualization and storage virtualization includingconfiguration management, physical to logical mapping, performancemanagement, failure management, and power consumption management.Additionally, the software of the invention can be embodied in acomputer readable storage medium.

Server virtualization may be implemented in the servers of the inventionusing virtual machine software. Examples of virtual machine softwareinclude VMotion available from VMware, Inc., of Palo Alto, Calif., andMicrosoft Virtual Server, available from Microsoft Corp. of Redmond,Wash. One or more virtual machines may be set up on a host server, and aguest operating system can be installed on each virtual machine.Applications, such as for providing services to customers, can then berun on the virtual machine using the guest operating system. Theapplications can also use virtualized storage under the invention, asdiscussed further below.

The invention includes methods for automatic and dynamic migration ofone or more applications from one server to another server. In migrationof an application according to the invention, the application softwareis set up on a separate server, preferably so as to run with the samesettings as on the current server. For example, the application and theguest operating system may be set up on a destination server at a remotedata center using virtual machine software. The settings for theapplication following migration may be set to be the same as beforemigration, so that the migrated application can be taken up (i.e.,started) where the original application leaves off. Also, in order formigration to be seamless, any logical units used by the application atthe original data center need to be replicated to the destination datacenter and kept up to date so that the migrated application is able toassume the services performed by the original application when theoriginal application is suspended, or during failure, disaster recovery,or the like.

In some embodiments, the invention is applied to a combination of servervirtualization management and storage virtualization management. Whenmigrating an application on a guest OS, an appropriate candidate serverand storage resource are selected based on data replicationavailability, adequate server resource availability, and impactanalysis. A change of a storage setting is synchronized with a change ofa server setting. Also, when migrating an application on a guest OS, anappropriate candidate server and storage resource are provided whiletaking into consideration power consumption. For example, maintainingthe power consumption within a predetermined limitation for a certaindata center. Further, impact analysis may be performed after migration,and a notification may be sent if the migration causes a powerconsumption limit to be exceeded.

Exemplary Configuration of Data Centers

FIG. 1 illustrates an example configuration of an information systemincluding a plurality of data centers 110, 120, 130, 140, 150 operablyconnected for communication with each other through a Wide Area Network(WAN) 210 via network gateways (GWs) 310, 320, 330, 340, 350,respectively. Gateways 310, 320, 330, 340, 350 convert a WAN networkprotocol to a Local Area Network (LAN) network protocol which is usedfor communication inside the data center. Gateways 310, 320, 330, 340,350 may include functions for named packet shaping and/or WANoptimization, including data compression for effective use of the WAN.As an example, WAN 210 may be the Internet and the LAN may be a localEthernet network, although the invention is not limited to anyparticular network type.

FIG. 2 illustrates an example of a general configuration inside a datacenter, which uses server virtualization technology and storagevirtualization technology. Data center 110 is illustrated, with it beingunderstood that data centers 120, 130, 140, 150 may have the same orsimilar configurations, although not all of data centers 120, 130, 140,150 are required to have all the components illustrated in FIG. 2.

In data center 110, a server virtualization management server 610manages server virtualization, including physical-server-to-guest-OSmapping, using server virtualization manager software 620. A storagevirtualization management server 910 manages storage virtualization,including physical-storage-to-logical-volume mapping, using storagevirtualization manager software 920. Server group 510 includes aplurality of virtualized servers as is discussed below with reference toFIG. 3, and storage group 810 consists of storage systems virtualizingother storage systems and virtualized storage systems, as is discussedbelow with reference to FIG. 4. A Storage Area Network (SAN) 710provides data transfer between storage systems in storage group 810and/or between servers in server group 510 and storage systems instorage group 810. A Local Area Network (LAN) 410 provides data transfernot limited to storage of data. A typical storage system includes a LANcommunication interface for management purposes. Storage virtualizationmanager 920 is able to communicate with storage systems in storage group810 via LAN 410 for managing and configuring the storage systems.Similarly, server virtualization manager 620 is able to communicate withserver group 510 via LAN 410 for managing and configuring servers inserver group 510.

A local resource manager 650 in data center 110 is a program that mayrun on a virtual machine or on another computer or server in the datacenter, and that maintains a list of all the resources inside the datacenter, such as server resources and storage resources, and tracks thestatuses of these resources. Additionally, at least one data center outof the plurality of data centers 110, 120, 130, 140, 150 includes aglobal resource manager 670, which is a program that may run on avirtual machine or on another computer or server in the data center, andthat communicates with each local resource manager 650 at each datacenter 110, 120, 130, 140, 150 to collect lists of resources and theirstatuses from each of these other data centers to create and maintain alist of all the resources of all the data centers 110, 120, 130, 140,150. Not every data center is required to maintain a global resourcemanager 670, so long as they are able to access global resource manager670 when necessary for searching for available resources in remote datacenters.

FIG. 3 illustrates an exemplary arrangement of server group 510, whichis composed of a plurality of physical servers, such as servers 1000,1100, 2000, 2100. Each server 1000, 1100, 2000, 2100 has a virtualmachine (VM) hypervisor 1030 that sits on top of server hardware andthat emulates dedicated server hardware for guest operating systems(G-OSs) 1040, 1041, 1042, 1140, 1141, 1142, 2040. Guest operatingsystems are able to function simultaneously and independently of eachother through virtual machine software to enable various differentapplications (APPs), 1050, 1051, 1052, 1150, 1151, 1152, 2050 to runsimultaneously and independently on the servers 1000, 1100, 2000, 2100.A VM manager agent 1060 collects and maintains configuration and statusinformation on each of the servers 1000, 1100, 2000, 2100. Additionally,each of the servers includes a SAN port 1010 to enable communicationwith SAN 710 and a LAN port 1020 to enable communication with LAN 410.

FIG. 4 illustrates storage group 810, which includes one or more storagesystems, such as storage systems 3000 and 4000. Storage system 3000 withvirtualization is a storage system that includes a virtualizationfunction that virtualizes physical storage capacity from one or morestorage systems 4000. Under this system of virtualization, storagesystem 3000 is configured to present one or more virtual storage volumes(virtual logical units—VLUs) 3074 as apparent storage resources, as ifthe physical storage capacity for these virtual volumes 3074 is providedat storage system 3000, when the physical storage capacity for thevirtual volumes is actually provided at storage system 4000 by LUs 4070configured on storage devices 4071, such as by a RAID controller 4090.Thus, from the servers' point of view each virtual volume 3074 is astorage volume configured from physical capacity located in the storagesystem 3000, when the physical storage capacity is actually located onstorage devices 4071 at one or more storage systems 4000.

Storage system 3000 is able to provide single point management of allthe storage systems in the storage group 810, provides an effectivemanagement scheme, and servers are able to use additional functionsprovided by storage system 3000, such as a remote copy function and ahigh performance cache. Storage system 3000 includes host adapters 3030for communication with servers over SAN 710 via SAN ports 3010. Avirtualization storage adapter 3075 provides communication with storagesystems 4000, so that data stored to virtual volumes 3074 is transmittedto logical units 4070 on storage system 4000 via a SAN port 3012. Also,storage system 3000 may include one or more storage devices 3071, suchas hard disk drives, solid state memory, optical drives, or the like. Inthis embodiment, one or more disk adapters 3060 may provide locallogical volumes (LUs) 3070 to servers. However, in other embodiments,storage system 3000 does not include any physical storage devices 3071,and serves solely as a virtualization apparatus.

LUs 3070 and virtual LUs 3074 are identified from servers using SCSI(small computer system interface) protocol or the like. Each LU 3070,3074, 4070 is defined as single logical contiguous memory space withfixed byte blocks. Applications Caches 3050, 4050 are provided tocompensate for access latency resulting from access delays in storagedevices 3071, 4071, respectively, to achieve better performance and toalso provide a data transfer buffer for storage functions includingremote copy, snapshot, and the like. A remote copy adapter 3076 having aSAN port 3012 in communication with SAN 710 is included in storagesystem 3000 for carrying out remote copy functions, as also discussedbelow. A cache switch 3040 connects host adapters 3030, cache 3050, diskadapters 3060, virtualization adapter 3075 and remote copy adapter 3076.Cache switch 3040 provides performance scalability required for storagesystem 3000. Service processors (SVPs) 3080, 4080 provide managementfunctions to storage systems 3000, 4000, respectively. SVP 3080 includesa LAN port 3020 and SVP 4080 includes a LAN port 4020 connected to LAN410 to enable communication with storage virtualization managementserver 910 and local resource manager 650. SVP 3080 is used to execute anumber of management modules, including a configuration manager 3500, astorage virtualization agent 3510, a remote copy manager 3520, a failuremanager 3530, a power manager 3540 and a performance manager 3550, eachof which manages those respective features of storage system 3000.Similarly, SVP 4080 on storage system 4000 executes a configurationmanger 4500, a failure manager 4520, a power manager 4530 and aperformance manager 4540.

Remote Copy (LU Replication)

FIG. 5 illustrates an example of a remote copy configuration accordingto the invention. Remote copy is a popular feature incorporated intoenterprise storage systems and entails creating a replication pairbetween a first LU in a first data center and a second LU in a seconddata center. Data written to one LU in a first storage system as aprimary volume is replicated to the second LU in the other storagesystem as a secondary volume. The storage systems are able to carryoutremote copy functions autonomously without having to send the datathrough any of the servers. In FIG. 5, data of a first volume on storagesystem 3000-1 at data center 110 is replicated to a second volume onstorage system 3000-2 at data center 120 using remote copy adapters3076-1, 3076-2 via WAN 210 and GWs 310, 320. In case of disaster at datacenter 110, services performed by application 1050-1 on server 1000-1using volume 3070-1 on storage system 3000-1 can be taken over by server1000-2 at data center 120 by application 1050-2 on server 1000-2 usingvolume 3070-2. In such a case, server virtualization manager 620-1 onserver virtualization management server 610-1 indicates migration ofapplication 1050-1 via VM manager agents 1060-1, 1060-2. As a result,application 1050-2 is initiated on server 1000-2 at data center 120. Itshould be noted that while logical volumes 3070 are illustrated forremote copy in FIG. 5, virtual volumes 3074 at either data center mayalso be made part of a replication pair for remote copy. Additionally,for safe and reliable takeover, application migration processes and datareplication processes should be synchronized. This synchronization isexplained further below with reference to FIGS. 13 and 14.

Resource Tables

A number of resource tables are maintained and used under the invention,as described below with reference to FIGS. 6-12. FIG. 6 illustrates anexemplary data structure of a server resource table 1210, which containsinformation on servers in the information system. Server resource table1210 includes a server identifier (ID) 12101, a location field 12102, aCPU performance field 12103, a main memory capacity 12104, LAN I/Fperformance and address 12105, such as an IP address and MAC address forthe interface, a SAN I/F performance and address 12106, including a WWNfor the interface, a connectable storage system field 12107, and an IPaddress 12108 of the management port for the server.

FIG. 7 illustrates an exemplary data structure of a servervirtualization table 1220, used by server virtualization manager 620,and which contains information of virtual machines and applications onservers. Server virtualization table 1220 includes a server ID field12201, a VM hypervisor ID 12202, a hypervisor type field 12203, a guestOS ID 12204, a guest OS type 12205, an application ID 12206, anapplication type 12207, an address 12208 of the LAN I/F of the server,an address 12209 of the SAN I/F of the server, and a LU IDs field 12210,which are used by the application. Server virtualization table 1220 isused by server virtualization manager 620 to relate guest OSs toapplication IDs and LU IDs. For example, when a guest OS is migrated,then the correct LU needs to be made connectable or migrated.

FIG. 8 illustrates an exemplary data structure of a storage resourcetable 1230 which contains information on storage systems in theinformation system. Storage resource table 1230 includes a storage ID12301, a location 12302 of the storage system, a SAN I/F performance,address and path ID 12303 to identify which LUs are connectable to theSAN I/F, a capacity 12304 of the cache memory, a number of LUs 12305, atotal usable capacity 12306, unallocated capacity 12307 which is theamount of the total capacity not yet allocated to servers, and an IPaddress 12308 of the management port of the storage system.

FIG. 9 illustrates an exemplary data structure of a storage LU table1240 which contains information on logical units in the informationsystem. Storage LU table 1240 includes a storage ID 12401; a LU ID12402, which is a volume ID used internally by the particular storagesystem; a path ID 12403; a target ID 12404; a logical unit number (LUN)12405 which is used in SCSI commands and which may be different from theLU ID 12402; a capacity of the LU 12406; a LU type 12407, which caninclude RAID type, application usage and the like; a LU status 12408,such as “online”, “failed” or “not allocated”; and a virtualized LUinformation 12409, that indicates if the LU is a virtualized LU and thatidentifies which LU 4070 on one of storage systems 4000 is associatedwith the LU by specifying the storage ID and LU ID.

FIG. 10 illustrates an exemplary data structure of a power consumptionmanagement table 1250 that can be used for managing power consumption atdata centers. Power consumption management table 1250 includes a datacenter ID 12501, a maximum power consumption 12502 permitted undercontract, an upper threshold value 12503, a lower threshold value 12504,and a typical power consumption 12505, which is the average consumptionmeasured over a period of time. When the upper threshold value 12503 isexceeded, an administrator should take measures to reduce powerconsumption so that the consumption falls below the lower thresholdvalue 12504. For example, when the power consumption exceeds the upperthreshold value 12503, one or more applications can be migrated to otherdata centers to decrease the power consumption at the local data center.Also, when the power consumption level of each data center is aconsideration for determining which data center should receive migrationof an application, power consumption table 1250 of FIG. 10 is used todetermine whether enough power resources at each data center would beavailable to be assigned to a migrating application, which may bedetermine when carrying out Step 6320 in FIG. 18.

FIG. 11 illustrates an exemplary data structure of a replication table1260 that is used to manage local and remote copy configurations formanaging logical units as replication pairs. Replication table 1260includes an entry of a replication ID 12601 for identifying thereplication pair, a primary storage ID 12602 that indicates the primarystorage system, a primary LU ID 12603 that indicates the ID of theprimary volume on the primary storage system, a secondary storage ID12604 that indicates the secondary storage system, a secondary LU ID12605 that indicates the secondary volume on the secondary storagesystem that makes up the replication pair with the primary volume, and areplication status 12606 that corresponds to phases illustrated in FIG.13, as discussed below. Thus, a replication pair can be establishedbetween two logical units in the same data center, and/or between alogical unit in a local data center and a logical unit in a remote datacenter.

FIG. 12 illustrates an exemplary data structure of an applicationmigration table 1270 for managing migration of applications. Applicationmigration table 1270 includes an application migration ID 12701, aprimary application ID 12701 used on the primary server, a primaryserver ID 12702, a primary data center ID 12703, a secondary applicationID 12704 used on the secondary server, a secondary server ID 12705, asecondary data center ID 12706, and a migration status 12707corresponding to the phases illustrated in FIG. 14, as discussed below.For example, when the primary server is running the application and thesecondary server is not running the application, a “pair” statusindicates that configuration information and key data for starting theapplication on the secondary server has been migrated to the secondaryserver so that the application is guaranteed to start and operateproperly on the secondary server if there is a failure of theapplication on the primary server.

Replication and Application Migration Status Diagrams

FIG. 13 illustrates a conceptual diagram of status transitions inreplication procedures. Replication, such as remote copy, is a functioncarried out by a storage system to replicate data of a primary LU on onestorage system to a secondary LU, typically on another storage system.For example, before a remote copy relationship is established betweentwo LUs, the status of each LU is simple 5000. To create a remote copypair, the primary and secondary LU that will form the pair must beidentified. Once a remote copy relationship is established between twoLUs, initial data copy 5001 is started to copy all the data currently inthe primary LU to the secondary LU. Pair status 5002 is established wheninitial copy 5001 is completed, and every block of data is identicalbetween the primary LU and the secondary LU. During pair status 5002,every update I/O operation (i.e., any new data written) to the primaryLU is copied to the secondary LU to keep contents of two LUs identical(i.e., a mirrored pair). In some cases, such as when a network link isdown, pair status 5002 is suspended and the status of the replicationpair is turned to suspended status 5003. Suspended status means thatupdate I/O operations to the primary LU are not copied to the secondaryLU, but a differential bit map is maintained to keep track of blocks inthe primary LU that have been updated on the primary storage system.Then, in order to resynchronize the replication pair to return to pairstatus 5002 from suspended status 5003, the differential bit map is usedduring a differential copy phase 5004 in which all the updated blockslisted in the differential bit map are copied to the secondary LU. Oncethe differential copy 5004 is completed, status becomes pair 5002. Thesestatuses are managed by SVPs 3080-1, 3080-2 on FIG. 5, based on commandsreceived from an application or management server.

FIG. 14 illustrates a conceptual diagram showing application migrationstatus transitions, which includes statuses similar to those discussedabove for remote copy. A simple status 5010 is a status without amigration relationship, i.e., migration of the application from oneserver to another has not yet been initiated. For example, withreference to the configuration illustrated in FIG. 5, App 1050-1 isrunning on server 1000-1 at data center 110. When App 1050-1 is to bemigrated to server 1000-2 at data center 120, then, during an initializephase 5011, server virtualization manager 620-2 obtains server resourcesrequired to support the migration and sets up guest OS 1040-2corresponding to the application using virtual machine software. Oncethe guest OS 1040-2 is set up on server 1000-2, pair status 5012indicates that application 1050-2 is created on the guest OS 1042-2 andprepared for taking over operations. To perform take over of theapplication from data center 110 to data center 120, status is changedto suspend 5013. Secondary application 1050-2 now starts services toclients in place of the primary application 1050-1. Status can bechanged to pair set up 5014 if migration of the application back to datacenter 110 ever needs to be carried out.

Server Migration and Storage Remote Copy Synchronization

When an application is migrated to another location, data in associatedLUs needs to be replicated with the application so that the applicationis able to continue to function properly following the migration.Application migration is managed by server virtualization manager 620,and remote copy is managed by the SVPs 3080 based on commands fromservers, such as storage virtualization management server 910. Themigration of the application and copying of the LUs should besynchronized to ensure data and reliable business continuity. Forexample, once LUs are in a pair status 5002, then application migrationis initialized 5011. Once applications are become pair status 5012, thenthe application can be quiesced, which means to temporarily stop theservices or transactions and write any dirty pages onto the secondaryLUs (differential copy 5004). Then remote copy is suspended 5003 for thesecondary LUs or the LUs are just made simple 5000, so that theapplication on the secondary server (i.e., destination server) can usedata of the secondary LUs on the secondary storage without beingaffected by any updates on the primary LUs. Further, in case operationof the application needs to be migrated back to the original datacenter, a reverse replication pair may be established whereby thesecondary LUs on the secondary storage system become the primary LUs,and the LUs that were formerly the primary LUs are used as the secondaryLUs for receiving remote copy, thereby eliminating the need for initialcopy 5001.

Resource Provisioning Process when Migrating an Application

FIG. 15 illustrates a flow chart of a process for provisioning resourcesfor migrating an application and guest operating system from one serverto another. The process of FIG. 15 might be triggered by manually by anadministrator, or can be triggered automatically, and can be carried outas a process of virtualization manager 620 or other programs running inthe data centers. For example, the process may be triggered toautomatically migrate an application when the power consumption at thelocal data center exceeds the upper threshold 12503 in power consumptiontable 1250. Another trigger may be when performance of an applicationfalls below a predetermined level as required for high availability ormission critical applications, so that load balancing or loaddistribution is required to reduce the load on the local data center bymigrating one or more applications to a remote data center. The processmight be triggered manually by an administrator setting up a remote datacenter as a contingency for taking over the application in case offailure at the local data center. Also, migration of an applicationwithin a local data center might be desired in the case of installationof new equipment, load balancing among existing equipment, optimizationof power consumption, or the like.

Step 6010: The resources required to provision the migration areidentified, as explained further below with reference to FIG. 16.

Step 6015: Once the resources required have been identified, the processsearches for resources within the local data center, as explained belowwith reference to FIG. 17.

Step 6020: If the required resources are found in the local data centerwithout replication of LUs, the process skips to Step 6045. On the otherhand, if there are not the required resources in the local data centerwithout replicating LUs, the process goes to Step 6025. For example, itis desirable that LU replication be avoided and that the migration takeplace within the local data center, so that migration is simplified.Thus, a resource that might satisfy these requirements would be a secondlocal server able to run the application and use the same LUs. However,such a solution might not meet the specified resource requirements, forexample, in the case that the purpose of the migration is to reducepower consumption at the data center, provide redundancy at a secondsite to protect against failure of a primary site, or other suchconsideration.

Step 6025: The process next determines whether the required serverresource would be sufficient in the local data center if LU replicationwere performed. If LU replication will satisfy the requirements theprocess skips to Step 6045, then LU replication is performed in Step6060 below using a candidate chosen in Step 6045. For example, in somedata centers, a server may be able to communicate with LUs on somestorage systems, but not with others. Thus, if an application ismigrated to this server from another server, such as for load balancing,the LUs need to be migrated so that the other server is able to accessthem.

Step 6030: Once the search for required resources in a local data centerhas failed to locate resources that meet the requirements, the processstarts to search for the required resources in the remote data centers,as described below with reference to FIG. 18.

Step 6035: If LU replication (i.e., remote copy) has already establishedfrom the local data center to one or more other data center, then thedata centers having those replicated LUs can be a candidate target formigration of the application because the LUs do not have be replicatedagain to support the migration. Thus, if a remote data center has therequired resources without requiring replication of LUs, then thatremote data center can be chosen and the process goes to Step 6045. Onthe other hand, if there was no remote copy of the required LUs, or ifthe data center to which the remote copy was made does not have therequired resources, then the process goes to Step 6040.

Step 6040: If there are not required resources available at a datacenter with replicated LUs, but there are enough resources on some otherremote data center, then that data center is chosen as a candidate, andit will be necessary to replication the required LUs. On the other hand,if the required resources are not available at any data center, then theprocess ends.

Step 6045: The resource candidates are selected according to therequirements and taking into account the consideration set forth above.

Step 6050: If there are multiple candidates for the migration, then theadministrator may choose one of them.

Step 6055: The process determines whether the chosen candidate requiresLU migration. If so, the process goes to Step 6060 and carries out themigration of the LUs from the source storage system to the destinationstorage system. Otherwise, the process skips to Step 6065.

Step 6065: The related resource tables are updated. For example, servervirtualization table 1220 is at least required to be updated when anapplication is migrated. If LUs are migrated, additional tables, such asstorage LU table 1240 must be updated. Depending on the actualconditions of migration, others of the resource tables also will neededto be updated.

FIG. 16 illustrates a flow chart of a process for identifying requiredresources for carrying out migration in Step 6010 of the process of FIG.15.

Step 6110: The process determines the identified application to migrate,refers to the server virtualization table 1220 of FIG. 7, and locatesthe entry for the application.

Step 6115: The process identifies the corresponding LU IDs listed in theserver virtualization table 1220 and determines the locations of theseLUs.

FIG. 17 illustrates a flow chart of a process for searching forresources within the local data center which is carried out during Step6015 of the process of FIG. 15.

Step 6210: The process checks whether there are existing replicas of theLUs that are needed to be used by the application by referring to thelocal resource manager 650 and resource tables 1210,1220.

Step 6215: When there are existing replica LUs in the local data center,the process locates the existing replicated LUs using replication table1260 of FIG. 11. In this case, in replication table 1260, the primarystorage ID entry 12602 and secondary storage ID entry 12604 would be forstorage systems that are both in the local data center, and in someembodiments may be the same storage system.

Step 6220: The process checks whether there are enough server resourcesassociated with the replicated LUs in the local data center using serverresource table 1210 of FIG. 6 and server virtualization table 1220 ofFIG. 7. For example, an application may require a particular level ofperformance, and thereby require a certain amount of processingcapacity, memory, or other server resources. When a sufficient amount ofserver resources are not available in the local data center forconnection to the existing replica LUs, then the process goes to Step6225; otherwise, the process goes to Step 6235.

Step 6225: The process reports that there are not enough serverresources associated with existing replicated LUs so that theadministrator has a chance to change the server configuration to makeuse of the existing replicated LU resource. Because replicating LUs cantake a substantial amount of time, it may be desirable in some instancesfor the administrator to instead free up server resources. If theadministrator is able to free sufficient server resources, then theprocess goes to Step 6235; otherwise, if the administrator is notinvolved, or if the administrator is not able to free sufficient serverresources, the process continues to Step 6230.

Step 6230: The process checks whether there are sufficient unallocatedLU resources connectable to sufficient required server resources withinthe local data center. For example, a certain amount of storage capacitywill generally be required for an application to run and maintain itsdata. These requirements will vary according to application.

Step 6232: The process locates candidate unallocated LUs in the localdata center that can be used to receive replication of the relevant LUs.

Step 6234: The process checks that sufficient server resources areconnectable to those candidate LUs.

Step 6235: When sufficient server and storage resources are located inthe local storage system, the process reports the located resources ascandidate targets of the migration.

Step 6240: On the other hand, when sufficient server or storageresources cannot be located in the local data center, the processreports that there are no migration candidate targets within the localdata center.

FIG. 18 illustrates a flow chart representing a process for searchingfor resources in the remote data centers. In some instances, one of therequirements of migration is that the migration be made to a remote datacenter, such as for reducing power consumption at the local data center,load balancing, preparing for disaster recovery, or the like.Accordingly, in these situations, the process would not be able tolocate any resources meeting the requirements in the local data center,and would search for available resources in the remote data centers.

Step 6310: The process checks whether there are any existing replicas ofthe LUs required by the application to be migrated already in place inany of the remote data centers by referring to the global resourcemanager 670.

Step 6315: The process locates the existing replicated LUs using theremote copy table 1260 of FIG. 11.

Step 6320: The process checks whether there are sufficient serverresources available in the remote data center that are connectable tothose existing replicated LUs by referring to server virtualizationtable 1220 of FIG. 7 and server resource table 1210 of FIG. 6. Duringthis step of checking for sufficient server resources, the process alsocan check for particular requirements of the migration, including powerconsumption and load balancing, in addition to checking for sufficientprocessing capacity and memory. For example, in the case of migration toreduce power consumption at the local data center, it is also desirablenot to cause the remote data centers to exceed their power consumptionlimitations. Thus, the process can refer to power consumption table 1250to locate the entry for the remote data center that has the existingreplicated LUs. If the typical power consumption entry 12505 is belowthe lower threshold 12504, then the remote data center is a goodcandidate for receiving migration of the application. On the other hand,if the typical power consumption 12505 is near or over the lowerthreshold 12504, then the remote data center is not a good candidate forreceiving the migration. Furthermore, power may be considerably lessexpensive at a data center located in one country, when compared with adata center located in another country. Accordingly, a power costconsideration may also be added to the server resources requirementswhen searching for available resources.

Similarly, with respect to load balancing, the process can determinewhether the remote data center has sufficient available bandwidth andprocessing capacity to meet certain performance requirements for theapplication. If the required bandwidth and processing capacity are notavailable at that remote data center, then the remote data center is nota good candidate for receiving the migrated application. FIG. 19illustrates an exemplary server resource consumption table 1280 that maybe used to manage load balancing between data centers. In the exampleillustrated, server resource consumption table 1280 indicatespredetermined threshold numbers of idle servers for each data center.Server resource consumption table 1280 includes entries for data centerID 12801, upper threshold of idle servers 12802 and lower threshold ofidle servers 12803, and a current percentage of idle servers 12804.Servers in a data center that have a lower CPU load may be categorizedas “idle”. For example if a server's CPU, as measured over a particularperiod of time, is in use less than a certain percentage of the time,such as 5-10 percent, then that server can be categorized as idle. Mostoperating systems today have functions to measure the CPU load on aserver. Thus, the local resource manager 650 is able to determine howmany servers in the data center can currently be classified as idle andreport this to the global resource manager 670. Then, by referring toserver resource consumption table 1280 the process is able to takeserver loads into consideration when considering whether a data centerhas sufficient server resources. Furthermore, applications can bemigrated to another data center having a current percentage of idleservers 12804 that is more than upper threshold 12802 if the currentpercentage of idle servers in the current data center falls below lowerthreshold 12803. For example, in FIG. 19, the current percentage of idleservers 12804 in Datacenter1 is 2 percent, while that of Datacenter2 is25 percent. Thus, the process may automatically attempt to migrateapplications from Datacenter1 to Datacenter2 until the currentpercentage of idle servers at Datacenter1 passes the upper threshold12802.

This is one example of load balancing that may take place between datacenters according to the invention. In FIG. 6, there are other serverresources defined, such as memory, LAN I/F (Network bandwidth), SAN I/F(storage access bandwidth), and the like, other than just CPU load.These resources could also be taken into consideration when determiningthe load of a data center, such as through calculating what percentageof aggregated resources is being used in a particular data center.

Step 6325: When there are insufficient resources at the remote datacenter that already has the replicated LUs, the process reports thatthere are insufficient server resources associated with the replica LUsso that the administrator has a chance to change the serverconfiguration to make use of the existing replicated LU resource.Because replicating LUs can take a substantial amount of time, it may bedesirable in some instances for the administrator at the remote datacenter to instead free up server resources. If the administrator is ableto free sufficient server resources, then the process goes to Step 6335;otherwise, if the administrator is not involved, or if the administratoris not able to free sufficient server resources, the process continuesto Step 6330.

Step 6330: The process determines whether there are enough serverresources associated with unallocated LU resources at any of the remotedata centers. The process also checks whether the remote data centersmeet other requirements for migration as discussed above, such as powerconsumption, load balancing, performance, and the like.

Step 6332: The process locates candidate unallocated LUs in one or moreof the remote data centers that can be used to receive replication ofthe relevant LUs.

Step 6334: The process checks that sufficient server resources areconnectable to those candidate LUs, taking into account the requirementsfor migration, including power consumption, load balancing, and thelike, as applicable.

Step 6335: The process reports those LU and server resources asmigration target candidates in Steps 6040 and 6045 of FIG. 15.

Step 6340: On the other hand, if no resources that match therequirements are located in any of the remote data center, the processreturns a response that there are not enough resources available tosupport migration of the application.

From the foregoing, it will be apparent that this invention can be usedin an information technology infrastructure using server virtualizationtechnology and storage virtualization technology, and especially in anarchitecture incorporating geographically dispersed data centers. Theinvention is able to automatically and dynamically migrate applicationsand guest operating systems to take into account various conditions at aplurality of data centers. The invention is able to take into accountnot only processing resources and data capacity resources, but also datareplication availability, power consumption, performance, loadbalancing, and the like, so that an effective and dynamic informationsystem infrastructure can be achieved over the local and remote datacenters.

Thus, it may be seen that the invention provides the ability todynamically migrate applications, operating systems, and associated datavolumes among a plurality of data centers to meet a variety ofconsiderations. Further, while specific embodiments have beenillustrated and described in this specification, those of ordinary skillin the art appreciate that any arrangement that is calculated to achievethe same purpose may be substituted for the specific embodimentsdisclosed. This disclosure is intended to cover any and all adaptationsor variations of the present invention, and it is to be understood thatthe above description has been made in an illustrative fashion, and nota restrictive one. Accordingly, the scope of the invention shouldproperly be determined with reference to the appended claims, along withthe full range of equivalents to which such claims are entitled.

1. A method of migrating an application, comprising: installing theapplication on a first server by setting up a first virtual machinerunning a guest operating system at a first data center, saidapplication accessing a first logical unit (LU) on a first storagesystem at said first data center; initiating migration by searching foravailable resources in a plurality of remote data centers; identifying acandidate remote data center from among said plurality of remote datacenters; and migrating said application and said guest operating systemto a second virtual machine installed on a second server located at saidcandidate remote data center.
 2. A method according to claim 1, whereinsaid step of identifying a candidate remote data center includes stepsof: determining whether there is a replica of said first LU alreadyexisting in any of said plurality of remote data centers, when there isthere is a replica, determining whether the remote data center at whichthe replica exists has server resources that meet requirements formigration of the application, and when the remote data center at whichthe replica exists has server resources that meet the requirements formigration of the application, identifying the remote data center atwhich the replica exists as the candidate remote data center forreceiving the migration.
 3. A method according to claim 1, wherein saidstep of identifying a candidate remote data center includes steps of:determining whether there is a replica of said first LU already existingin any of said plurality of remote data centers, when there is noreplica, determining whether any of the remote data centers have storageresources and server resources that meet requirements for migration ofthe application, and when one of said remote data centers has availablestorage resources and server resources that meet the requirements formigration of the application, identifying the one of the remote datacenters as the candidate remote data center for receiving the migration.4. A method according to claim 1, further including the step ofinitiating the migration by first searching said local data center foravailable resources by determining if a replica of said first LU existsat the local data center and is accessible by available server resourcesthat meet requirements for migration of the application; when a replicaof the first LU does not exist at the local data center, determiningwhether the local data center has storage resources and server resourcesthat meet requirements for migration of the application, and when areplica of the first LU does not exist at the local data center and thelocal data center does not have storage resources and server resourcesthat meet requirements for migration of the application, searching foravailable resources in the plurality of remote data centers.
 5. A methodaccording to claim 1, further including the step of creating said firstLU as a virtual LU, wherein data stored to said virtual LU on said firststorage system is stored by said first storage system to an actual LU inanother storage system that maps to the virtual LU, said other storagesystem being located at the local data center and storing the data tophysical storage devices from which the actual LU is configured.
 6. Amethod according to claim 1, wherein said step of identifying acandidate remote data center includes examining power consumptioninformation for the candidate remote data center to determine whetherpower consumption for the candidate remote data center is within aspecified limit.
 7. A method according to claim 1, further including thestep of replicating the first LU to the candidate remote data centerwhen a replica of the first LU is not already present at the candidateremote data center using a remote copy function, so that the replica ofthe first LU at the candidate remote data center is synchronized withthe first LU when the application is suspended at the local data centerand the migrated application at the remote data center is able to usethe replica of the first LU to take over for the suspended application.8. An information system comprising: a plurality of data centers locatedgeographically remotely from each other, said data centers eachincluding one or more servers and one or more storage systems, said datacenters being in communication with each other via a network; and afirst virtual machine running on a first server having a guest operatingsystem with an application installed thereon at a first said datacenter, said application accessing a first logical unit (LU) on a firststorage system at said first data center, wherein, when migration ofsaid application is initiated, said first data center is configured todetermine whether one of said plurality of data centers has serverresources and storage resources required to receive migration of theapplication, wherein a destination data center is selected from one ormore candidate data centers meeting requirements for migration of theapplication, and wherein said first data center is configured to migratethe application and the guest operating system to a second virtualmachine set up on a second server at the destination data center.
 9. Theinformation system according to claim 8, wherein the first data centeris configured to determine whether there is a replica of said first LUalready existing in any of said plurality of data centers, wherein, whenthere is there is a replica, the first data center determines whetherthe data center at which the replica exists has server resources thatmeet requirements for migration of the application, wherein, when thedata center at which the replica exists has server resources that meetthe requirements for migration of the application, the first data centeridentifies the data center at which the replica exists as one of saidcandidate data centers for receiving the migration, wherein, when thereis no replica, the first data center is configured to determine whetherany of the data centers have storage resources and server resources thatmeet requirements for migration of the application, and wherein, whenone of said data centers has available storage resources and serverresources that meet the requirements for migration of the application,identifying the one of the data centers as one of said candidate datacenters for receiving the migration.
 10. The information systemaccording to claim 8, wherein said first data center is configured toinitiate the migration of the application when a load on the first datacenter exceeds a predetermined load threshold set for the first datacenter.
 11. The information system according to claim 8, wherein saidfirst data center is configured to initiate the migration of theapplication when an amount of power consumed at the first data centerexceeds a predetermined power consumption threshold set for the firstdata center.
 12. The information system according to claim 8, whereinsaid first LU is a virtual LU configured on said first storage system,said virtual LU mapping to an actual LU on a second storage system atsaid data center, wherein data stored to said virtual LU on said firststorage system is stored by said first storage system to the actual LUin the second storage system in the first data center, which stores thedata to physical storage devices.
 13. The information system accordingto claim 8, wherein said first data center is configured to identify acandidate data center for receiving migration of the application, atleast in part, by examining power consumption information for the datacenters to determine whether the power consumption for the candidatedata center is below a specified threshold.
 14. The information systemaccording to claim 8, wherein said first data center is configured toreplicate the first LU to the destination data center when a replica ofthe first LU is not already present at the destination data center usinga remote copy function, so that the replica of the first LU at thedestination data center is synchronized with the first LU, such that,when the application is suspended at the local data center, the migratedapplication at the destination data center takes over for the suspendedapplication.
 15. An information system comprising: a local data centerhaving one or more local servers in communication with one or more localstorage systems; a plurality of remote data centers locatedgeographically remotely from each other and said local data center, saidremote data centers each including one or more remote servers and one ormore remote storage systems in communication with each other; said localdata center and said plurality of remote data centers being incommunication with each other via a network; a first virtual machinehaving a guest operating system configured and having an applicationoperational thereon on a first said local server at said local datacenter, said application conducting input/output (I/O) operations to afirst logical unit on a first said local storage system at said firstdata center; wherein, when migration of said application is initiated,said local data center is configured to determine whether said localdata center has server resources that meet requirements of the migrationof the application; wherein, when said local data center does not haveserver resources to meet requirements of the migration of theapplication, the local data center is configured to determine whetherone of said plurality of remote data centers has server resources thatmeet the requirements of the migration of the application; wherein adestination data center is selected from one or more candidate datacenters meeting the requirements for migration of the application; andwherein said local data center is configured to migrate the applicationand the guest operating system to a second virtual machine configured onthe destination data center.
 16. The information system according toclaim 15, wherein the local data center is configured to determinewhether there is a replica of said first LU already existing in any ofsaid plurality of data centers, wherein, when there is there is areplica, the local data center determines whether the data center atwhich the replica exists has server resources that meet requirements formigration of the application, wherein, when the data center at which thereplica exists has server resources that meet the requirements formigration of the application, the local data center identifies the datacenter at which the replica exists as one of said candidate data centersfor receiving the migration, wherein, when there is no replica, thelocal data center is configured to determine whether any of the datacenters have storage resources and server resources that meetrequirements for migration of the application, and wherein, when one ofsaid data centers has available storage resources and server resourcesthat meet the requirements for migration of the application, said localdata center is configured to identify one of the data centers as one ofsaid candidate data centers for receiving the migration.
 17. Theinformation system according to claim 15, wherein said local data centeris configured to initiate the migration of the application when anamount of power consumed at the local data center exceeds apredetermined power consumption threshold or when a load on the localdata center exceeds a predetermined load threshold.
 18. The informationsystem according to claim 15, wherein said first LU is a virtual LUconfigured on said first local storage system said virtual LU mapping toan actual LU on a second local storage system at said local data center,wherein data stored to said virtual LU on said first local storagesystem is transferred by said first storage system to the actual LU inthe second local storage system in the local data center, which storesthe data to physical storage devices.
 19. The information systemaccording to claim 15, wherein said local data center is configured toidentify a candidate data center for receiving migration of theapplication by examining power consumption information for the datacenters to determine whether the power consumption for the candidatedata center is below a specified threshold.
 20. The information systemaccording to claim 15, wherein said local data center is configured toreplicate the first LU to the destination data center when a replica ofthe first LU is not already present at the destination data center usinga remote copy function, so that the replica of the first LU at thedestination data center is synchronized with the first LU, such that,when the application is suspended at the local data center, the migratedapplication at the destination data center uses the replica of the firstLU to take over for the suspended application.